Tag: mindful

Days like today are when I find that I am less mindful and more reactive. It was a tough day at work, where misunderstandings are aplenty and very little is achieved. This is when I find myself exhausted because I am trying to keep my peace of mind but like a virus willing to spread itself, stress likes to outsmart me.

This is why living with awareness is tough because you can see someone’s ego, your own ego but the other person probably doesn’t even know they are acting out of ego. That is when you always have to be the better person.

However, there are times when the pressure is there and you feel that it is weighing you down. I would always say that mindfulness helps if one remembers to do so. Sometimes, we have to vent and get things off our mind but seldom are we ever understood.

In circumstances like this, it is hard to deliver your very best because you are expected to juggle a 100 things in a limited schedule. This is when I believe quantity definitely overpowers quality and that is with anything in life. As they say, less is more.

Like this:

We go to work and sometimes we want to do our very best but we have pressing deadlines, we have projects to start, projects to keep tracking, projects that are about to finish and all we want is to have a bit of peace time to do the quality work that is necessary.

Sometimes, we take on so much work that the quality decreases and as we all now, deadlines and added work never mix well together. However, what really defines a place is how the management deal with everything that is going on.

To me, the role of a manager is to lead by example, whether in crisis or at peace time. One, they are always courteous and respectful. Two, they look to resolve something and make minimal comments about the matter. They don’t give their opinion, they look for solutions. Three, they look to encourage instead of discourage. Four, they put trust at the forefront of the conversation.

With these 4 aspects, if the manager follows that, the employee works super hard and does their best work as long as they are able to complete the tasks under the weekly work hours. It is all about understanding and when we come from that place, we are mindful of the employee and their journey. We will consider what is going on in their lives, what their perceptions are of their managers, how are they feeling about the tasks they are doing and most of all, that work is not adding stress to their lives but making their lives easier.

For me, the sign of how well a manager is doing is if their employee looks forward to going to work every morning. If they don’t, then something is up. The manager may not be the issue but upper management. What really needs to happen is a true dialogue.

Many times, our egos like to take control of a situation and it runs on a rampage and tries to destroy everything that is perceptually wrong but only if we dug a little deeper, tried to be reasonable and had a balanced mind, managers would see the larger picture.

We have to work hard when we go to work for sure, but never overwork that you reach the point of stressing out. It is not worth it. Keep your cool and keep your peace.

Like this:

Today, I am very happy to say that Niharika Ahuja, a very dear friend and a fellow traveller in spirituality has written a blog for me and the readers of this blog. I have known Niharika for years and her wisdom and spiritual understanding is truly remarkable as you will discover when you read the post she has written. She has reached some amazing spiritual heights despite her young age and has been a continuous inspiration

. I have learned a lot from Niharika and I am sure with this blog, you will also learn from her. Niharika also has a blog and catch up on her insightful posts on https://livinginyourlight.wordpress.com

Awareness:

Research indicates as per majority’s beliefs, the average person has 70,000 thoughts
in one day. How crazy is that? That is 70,000 times a day that the average person is
not living within the moment because she or he is thinking about something that
happened in the past or dreaming about something they desire in the future. This
explains why the topic of mindfulness has gained so much interest in society.

Most people will argue why it even matters if they are engrossed in their thoughts?
It matters because the more we let our minds wander to the thoughts of the past or
future, we are taking THAT very moment away from us and our loved ones too. A
second or even an hour after, we will also regret losing those moments we spent
pondering on what could have been or could be, rather than enjoying the
opportunities, people and beauty that surrounded us in that very moment.

Call it awareness, being cautious or more mindful, when every act is done with your
attention in whatever you are doing, you live life in the most enriching and beautiful
way. One may think that doing the dishes, walking your dog, drinking your tea or
even eating may be ordinary things or obligations that do not require our undivided
attention. However, I believe if we do even these smallest acts with our whole heart
and mind, we will start to fully experience the beauty of life and cherish all that it
has to offer.

Research indicates that when we become mindful in whatever we are doing, hearing,
seeing, speaking, eating etc., any depression and anxiety that one may have may also start to diminish and heal. The more I practice mindfulness in my own life, I realize how
many hours on end I wasted being absent from my present moments and a slave to
things I have no control over now. Some moments that are lost can never be
recovered again and soon enough, that will be another grief we will mourn or
ponder over in another present moment, in the future.

An example that I have personally witnessed is where a loved one may be sitting in
front of us trying to engage in a conversation. That person could be going through a
mental illness and may be yearning for a person to talk to for support or any last
sign of hope or love to hold onto. When we don’t give that person our attention and
are too focused on what happened in our own past or how many likes we got on our
picture posted on instagram, we could be giving them (and even ourselves) another
reason to go home and feel worse about their situation and feel more alone than
ever. Every moment and time of ours and others is precious and the less we remain
aware of that, we may be exposed to an entire lifetime of never really living our life
and becoming inspired by things that other people have to offer.

The truth is, we never really know when our last moment will be. It is in our hands
what we choose to spend our last moments doing- living in something in the past, or
could we say that we were fully enjoying and celebrating the greatest present- the
present moment…because it is another opportunity for us to start anew and
experience and create more beautiful memories to hold on to.

The simple habit of putting away our phones when we are meeting with someone,
looking at the smile on your dog’s face when you walk him/her and the sound of the
a loved one’s laugh or nature, mindfulness then becomes not a forced practice or
ritual, but a way of life and an excelled art of beautiful being and living.

Like this:

Today, my day was attempting to be stressful and there was huge pressure from work and I could just feel this cloud gover over me, ready to collapse at any time. Even though, the perception would be that the cloud is light, not this one. The cloud of stress is heavy.

In these times, I try to remain mindful, observe my surroundings and try and be a little bit positive. Even when it is tough to do so, I try not to stop smiling. However, that doesnt mean I just cope. In certain circumstances, when I have felt misused or taken advantage of, I end up looking for new opportunities.

The one thing that I do when looking for new opportunities is to make sure that I remain positive and optimistic. It is important that a sense of peace and happiness should be done in the search for new opportunities. The energy that we give out to our environment, is the energy that is most likely to continue. So if it is negative, negative will be the environment, positive and positive will be the environment.

I will not lie that today I felt like I was being crushed, overwhelmed and somehow thrown under the bus but I only allow that to happen if I accept that it is happening in my consciousness. Instead I turned those feelings to this is a challenge and opportunity to show my resilience and initiative.

I hope your day went well and share with me, how you have dealt with such situations.